31st July 1991 Day 11

1991:
picked up at 00:15am by Kelly, a friend of Oz's from Estes Park. Can't be a real friend, she calls him Dave! After a short (approx 15 miles) drive from Omaha to Kelly's house which was, apparently, still in Omaha, Dave and Kelly swapped stories, and we sank a couple of beers and looked at Kelly's photos of Europe.


Zzzzzz....lots of sleep.

Woke up to a large American sweet breakfast and discovered, to our horror, that all the trains from Omaha to Salt Lake City were booked up for at least the next 13 days. Panic. After lots of wheeling and dealing, the plan became: Omaha -> Lincoln via Kelly's car, Lincoln -> Denver via Greyhound Bus, Denver -> Winter Park via thumb or Greyhound (we also had 1 Amtrak reservation) and finally rejoin the train to Salt Lake City at Winter Park. We shall see, watch this space. We also made provisional bookings on the rest of our trip at this point.


After the panic had died down we picked up one of Kelly's friends, Angela, and headed for the sights of Omaha. We visited the place where they both taught - an institution called Boys Town - but we were disappointed to find there were no scheduled gigs by the Boys Town Gang. We visited a creek and pretended to be Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, Becky and some other bird from a Mark Twain novel. Shame the creek was a river running low. We visited a "small town" * (see John Cougar Mellencamp) and took photos of the hardware store - no Ike or Mr Cunningham. The saloon was a little disappointing as there were no swinging doors and no-one was thrown out. 

Angela, Kelly, "Dave"

Later on we went for a big (big) steak in Iowa (Idiots out walking again - in Nebraskan parlance) and visited the marketplace in Omaha. Very impressive and up-market. There was more life in one street than I'd imagined there was in the whole of Nebraska. Also discovered RH (raging hormone) syndrome and cow tipping.


* - Elkhorn


2011
During a Uni break Oz had been on a US summer camp with Stu-boy and had met Kelly during this period. Can't recall much more about this other than Oz making fun of Stu's knowledge of the US. Stu's pronunciation of San Joes springs to mind. Oz may have to fill in  some details if he's so inclined.


I recall having french toast and water melon for breakfast - fantastic. To this day I love American breakfasts. During my time living in the US (93-95) I think my two favourite restaurants were Waffle House (scattered, smothered, covered, chunked, topped, diced and peppered) and iHOP.


Can't recall the context for the RH comment but don't think it had anything to do with the film. Also can't recall who Ike was.